Foreign Relations of the United States, 1964–1968, Volume XVIII, Arab-Israeli Dispute, 1964–1967

215. Telegram From the Embassy in the United Arab Republic to the Department of State¹

Cairo, May 15, 1965.

4011. Verbatim text. Following is GUAR unofficial translation letter to President Johnson from President Nasser handed to me by Foreign Minister today. Letter dated May 12. Will pouch original and translation corrected as necessary.

“Dear Mr. President:

It was my intention to send to Washington, my colleague and friend Dr. Mahmoud Fawzi, Deputy Premier for Foreign Affairs in the United Arab Republic, with a request that you should meet him, so that he might brief you on mine and the government’s point of view on a number of important issues with events occurring in the Middle East or beyond it, and which directly or indirectly affect relations between our two countries.

Yet, at the time, I noticed that you were reducing your foreign engagements to a minimum, and so I found fit to put off my intention of sending Dr. Mahmoud Fawzi to Washington.

Fortunately enough, however, Mr. Phillips Talbot, American Assistant Secretary of State passed through Cairo at the time, and I found it appropriate that I should explain to him and to Ambassador Lucius Battle, who attended the meeting, our position in detail regarding the contents of your letter, dated 18th March 1965,² and with regard to a number of other issues which I thought best that each of us should be acquainted with the other’s position on them in all frankness and clarity.

I have full confidence in the ability of Mr. Talbot and Ambassador Battle to convey to you a full and detailed picture of my long talk with him at my home on Sunday 18th April 1965.³

If I may stress a few points, I wish to underline the following:

1. The United Arab Republic is very anxious to maintain Arab-American friendship and underlines the necessity of its permanent consolidation. While unfortunately, we find obstacles and difficulties impeding this objective, we have and still do exert all efforts to keep the door open before a free and responsible exchange of ideas and viewpoints. We sincerely maintain that this door should be kept open in the interest of the American and Arab peoples and for the sake of peace in a delicate and sensitive part of the world.

2. The United Arab Republic has not started or planned the arms race in the Middle East, but the United Arab Republic was compelled, following inadmissible armed provocations, to afford itself the ability of legitimate defence against a hostile and expansionist danger represented in the racist Zionism, to which imperialism has facilitated the usurpation of a parcel of the Arab land, to be used as a base to menace the will of the Arab nation for freedom and as a barrier against Arab aspiration to unity.

The records—those of the United Nations included—bear witness to the fact that the United Arab Republic has used its armaments only in defence rights, while aggression always came from those who know they adopt a position hostile to nature itself and to history and which is incompatible with the principles of justice and law. Events of 1956 are fraught with proofs and meanings.

3. It is regrettable indeed, that a number of Western countries in general, undertook the responsibility of arming Israeli aggression through dangerous transactions mostly concluded secretly: these include what France offered Israel in early 1956, while the last of these transactions was the offer made by the Government of Federal Germany to Israel, the repercussions of which still remain in the area strong and violent.

The Government of West Germany occupied an excellent position in the Arab world, and it is regrettable to the Bonn government and to the West as a whole, that this prominent position which formed a bridge between the Arabs and the West and was a vast path for positive and fruitful co-operation, should be destroyed.

Yet, the United Arab Republic is still determined not to allow bitterness to be the centre of accumulation to Middle East forces.⁴

The difference is basically between the Arab nation and Israeli aggression and its expansionist aims. Here, I wish to observe that efforts, often unbearable, are exerted to restrict the dispute to that framework.

4. The people of the United Arab Republic find and are convinced that the true challenge they face is for the achievement of progress and the development of their life socially, economically and culturally, so that they might lead a life in line with their age, and contribute, with other nations, to the honouring of human value. I wish to state that the constructive achievements of which the Egyptian people carry the burden, constitute a brilliant example of the determination of peoples, who found themselves bound by the chains of underdevelopment—to reshape their lives in spite of great difficulties that burden them and force themselves around them.

The people of the United Arab Republic believe that the arms race is a temporary feature, put in motion by bitter experience and crises, and supported by suspicion every day. Yet, what will finally resist and last is life alone, built by the determination of men, their creative minds and their ability to exploit all resources afforded them in the fields of production and services.

The outbursts of aggression can but destroy themselves, and the will of life, always remains stronger than all its enemies.

Please accept, dear President, kindest respects and very best wishes. (sgd) (Gamal Abdel Nasser)”

Battle

1. Source: National Archives and Records Administration, RG 59, Central Files 1964–66, POL ARAB–ISR. Secret; Priority; Exdis. There is no time of transmission on the telegram, which was received at 10:36 a.m. Passed to the White House.
2. Document 192.
3. See Document 208.
4. Telegram 4013 from Cairo, May 17, reported that the correct translation of this sentence was as follows: “Nevertheless the UAR is still determined that bitterness should not result in the polarization of power in the Near East.” (National Archives and Records Administration, RG 59, Central Files 1964–66, POL ARAB–ISR)